The biggest shift in Christian thinking is in the area of trusting God and doubting ourselves. Yes, I said DOUBTING ourselves!
Before we were Christians, we trusted ourselves and doubted God but now we must reverse that ever so quickly. We must walk by faith not by sight and that’s what it is referring to in Proverbs 3:5-8 as well as in our proverb of the day:
Proverbs 16:2: “All the ways of a man are pure in his own eyes, but the Lord weighs the spirit.”*
To us, everything we do LOOKS pure but the Lord knows our hearts and our attitudes for WHY we do things! God is not fooled! He alone knows the heart according to Jeremiah 17:9-10: “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it? 10 “I the LORD search the heart and test the mind, to give every man according to his ways, according to the fruit of his deeds.”* Only the Lord knows the heart and when this proverb warns us that our ways look pure, we need to ask God to shed light to us about the motives and intentions of our hearts through His Word and the Holy Spirit (Hebrews 4:12).
Again, remember Proverbs 3:5: “Trust in the LORD with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding.” So Who does God say you should trust: Him or you?
-Mark (learning to doubt myself and trust God fully)
*The Holy Bible: English standard version. 2001. Wheaton: Standard Bible Society.